Article citations below are gathered from published journals and newsletters which are held in the BMD TIC collection. These materials may be protected by copyright restrictions.

May 14, 1999

Senate Committee Calls For New Satellite Launch Policy

. Aerospace Daily, May 10, 1999, p 211

The Senate Intelligence Committee has called on the Clinton Administration to reappraise its policy of allowing US satellites to be launched from China, given evidence that sensitive technology transferred to China has helped its ballistic missile development.

The Army's Space & Missile Defense Command (SMDC) sees its program to base lightweight phased-array radars on aerostats as a low-cost way to take full advantage of its defensive weapons at a cost roughly one-tenth that of aircraft-based radars. The Joint Land-Attack Cruise Missile Defense Elevated Netted Sensor System (JLENS) is primarily intended to tackle the growing threat of cruise missiles to US forces deployed abroad.

The Pentagon is scrubbing the requirements of its NMD system in anticipation of the mid-2000 deployment go-ahead review. The scrub has just begun and has focused so far on adding greater detail to existing requirements, not major changes to the requirements themselves, said LTG John Costello, commander of the Army Space and Missile Defense Command. The Pentagon is supposed to decide shortly which service will be in charge of the ground based portion of the program. The Army has been lobbying hard for the role and is likely to get the nod later this month, Costello predicted. The service already has plans to assign some 450 Army National Guard and contractor personnel to the program.

The political wrangling over the trinational MEADS has been largely resolved, allowing the program to move forward. Italy and Germany have accepted the US proposal to use the PAC-3 missile as the air defense interceptor for MEADS, said LTG John Costello, commander of the Army Space and Missile Defense Command. Costello is urging Army leaders to strengthen their support of MEADS.

BG Larry Dodgen, deputy director of JTAMDO, recently said that the military will need both cruise missile and ballistic missile defenses by 2010 because that is when the threat of coordinated attacks using both kinds of missiles will be greatest.

The Air Force's Airborne Laser (ABL) program, which over the past six months has been embroiled in controversy over its technical maturity, is focusing on next April's Critical Design Review (CDR) as the top priority.

Jacques Gansler, Pentagon acquisition chief, has approved continued development of the Navy's Theater Wide(NTW) missile defense system, but has set out specific tasks for the Navy and BMDO to achieve during the next year. Primary among the tasks is to develop a single mission feasibility study for NTW. This is based on the idea of mounting NTW on cruisers independent of the Aegis suite in order to field NTW in advance of its current projected date of 2007.

The budget for the Joint Land Attack Cruise Missile Defense Elevated Netted Sensors (JLENS) has been increased as the high altitude radar bearing balloons are considered an integral part of Theater Missile Defense. The balloons, which are called aerostats, are shaped like blimps, and carry tracking and search radar which could look over hills to see incoming cruise missiles.

Russian military leaders are divided about creating a joint command for Russia's strategic nuclear forces (SNF). Currently there are four separate nuclear command chains. Defense Minister Igor Sergeyev strongly supports the idea. The Russian Navy is strongly opposed to consolidation of command. Other critics point to the lack of interoperability as the chief barrier to integration in a time of depleted financial resources for the Russian military.

In an editorial piece soon to be published in the journal "Arms Control Today", Spurgeon Keeny, president and executive director of the Arms Control Association, calls on President Clinton to resist the push by NMD enthusiasts for what he views as an unwarranted deployment of NMD.

NMD program engineers will use a C-band beacon on a target during the upcoming NMD flight test in order to help guide an interceptor missile to the correct point in space where its kill vehicle can dispense and hit the mark. The flight test-- referred to as integrated flight test-3 (IFT-3)--will be the first actual intercept attempt with the NMD system the US is currently developing.

BG Willie Nance, who heads the NMD JPO, told reporters at a SMDC media event last week that his staff is in the process of providing DoD leadership a list of the criteria to be used at the NMD deployment readiness review next year and two Defense Acquisition Board meetings to follow.

In order to address the countermeasures challenge, the technical experts are calling for modifications in the design of current US missile defenses as well as a change in the attitude of government officials when considering the countermeasures threat.

Defense acquisition chief Jacques Gansler is expected soon to approve an acquisition decision memo making the Navy's Theater Wide ballistic missile defense system a program with an official development and test and evaluation schedule.

Senior NMD program and defense industry officials confirmed last week they are exploring multiple site alternatives as possible deployment options of a land-based NMD program even though with the NMD deployment readiness review, DDR, a little more than a year away, BMDO's mandate remains to prepare for fielding at one site in either Alaska or North Dakota.

Rep Curt Weldon (R-PA), sponsor of a House NMD bill passed in March said last week that he expects that lawmakers will soon start hammering out a conference bill calling for the deployment of a NMD system. The House and Senate NMD bills vary slightly.

Details of the initiative to address threats posed by weapons of mass destruction (WMD) proliferation that NATO leaders agreed to last month at the NATO Summit in Washington, DC, are included in this article.

German, Italian, and US representatives are continuing efforts to resolve several administrative issues so they may choose the contracting team for the upcoming three-year risk reduction effort for the MEADS system. In a April 21 letter to German national armaments director Kaempf, Jacques Gansler USD(A&T) said the US is "making efforts to arrange a meeting of the tri-nation source selection committee to finalize the downselect decision by the end of May." A copy of this letter is included with the article.

The first official intercept attempt with the PAC-3 missile will take place at WSMR with May 13 as the target date. The primary purpose of the test, known as developmental test-3 (DT-3), will be to intercept the target missile, Hera.

The fledgling US NMD program is suffering test delays and accusations that its proposed tests do not simulate realistic conditions. USA had planned to conduct four NMD intercept test between next month and June 2000, but has postponed the first test by two months because the EKV sprang a fuel leak during a November hover test. The first test of the NMD system, an actual 'hit-to-kill' attempt, is now scheduled for 12 August. David Wright, a senior fellow at the MIT, told the US Senate Foreign Relations Committee on 4 May: "If the US is serious about deploying a defense against ballistic missiles launched at its territory, then it should be serious about finding out if the technology is ready. The only way to find out is by a rigorous and realistic testing program."

Recent studies of Russia's military show that as a result of greatly reduced spending and the effects of severe inflation, Russian military capabilities have declined enormously. Equipment has deteriorated, fuel is in very short supply, strength is down, and military pay and pensions are months in arrears. In addition, the break up of the Soviet Union has resulted in many of the most important military facilities no longer being under Russian control. For instance, important naval bases are now under the control of Lithuania, Latvia, and Ukraine. Another concern is the large quantity of nuclear weapons, both within Russia's borders, and in countries of the former Soviet Union. The US has tried to ensure that these weapons do not migrate to rogue states by spending $4b to help Russia, Belarus, Kazakhstan and Ukraine destroy nuclear and other weapons of mass destruction. Part of the US strategy is to encourage Russia to become a modern democratic state. The admission of Poland, the Czech Republic, and Hungary into NATO, and the recent NATO bombing of Yugoslavia have been seen as threatening by Russia.

Ashton B. Carter and William J. Perry, former Carter administration officials have recently

published a book titled "Preventive Defense." They call for the development of non-nuclear responses to attacks by rogue states or terrorists. One suggestion is better planning and more effective intelligence collection. Pentagon leaders are also concerned about the threat of chemical and biological weapons.

The Pentagon is developing defenses against chemical and biological attacks. Six new systems will be fielded this year, and research continues. Defenses may be in the form of detection devices or protective garments and other protective gear.